Turn Sparrows Point into shipping terminal, Kamenetz says

Baltimore County Executive Kevin Kamenetz on Friday said he will begin pushing for a new shipping terminal at Sparrows Point as part of a broader plan to reinvigorate industry on the peninsula formerly home to Bethlehem Steel.

Kamenetz called a news conference on Friday to mark the release of the Sparrows Point Partnership’s report on future uses for Sparrows Point. In addition to a shipping terminal, the advisory group of port officials and business executives is recommending the 3,300-acre peninsula be used for clean energy facilities, advanced manufacturing and distribution and logistics to support the expected increase in shipping traffic that will come with the Panamax canal expansion scheduled for completion in 2015.

The report estimates a revitalized Sparrows Point would create 10,000 new jobs, but 90 percent of those jobs are dependent on the new shipping terminal and a new dredging containment site that would take more than 10 years to complete. Kamenetz said in the short term developing a former iron ore pier at Coke Point that would receive bulk commodities and newly manufactured automobiles would create 1,000 jobs.

Environmental Liability Transfer Co. of St. Louis owns Coke Point and said Friday it is still in negotiations with the Port Administration.

Kamenetz said during a news conference on Friday that Coke Point could be home to both a shipping terminal and the dredging facility. Developing the land for that purpose would help spur an industrial renaissance, he said.

“The Coke Point area can accommodate a dredge containment site that will allow deep-channel maintenance — and therefore extended vitality — of the existing port,” Kamentez said. “Once the dredge containment site is completed in 10 to 12 years, the Maryland Port Administration believes a new marine terminal can be built on the expanded site, creating a potential for 9,000 new family-supporting jobs.”

But the cleanup efforts at Coke Point are significant, Kamenetz acknowledged, and are projected to cost as much as $75 million. He pledged to hold the current owner accountable for the cleanup, saying the owner “must recognize that we will not allow them to avoid this cleanup obligation.”

The sale will be critical to even the short-term development Coke Point, including the turning basin that will allow a new “roll-on, roll-off” facility to support the increased container ship traffic from the widened Panama Canal. Kamenetz said he expects distribution and logistics parks could develop on the northern section of Sparrows Point on both sides of Interstate 695.